There are many environments in which multiple tools and disposables are used, including for example operation rooms, hangars, garages, or the like.
An operation room is a facility in which intrusive operations are performed on patients. Typically, multiple people participate in an operation, including a chief surgeon, sometimes an assistant surgeon, an anesthesiologist, a scrub nurse, and a circulating nurse. The participating personnel members use multiple tools, such as scalpels, forceps, and others, varying according to the surgery being performed. Also used are multiple disposable items, such as sponges of various sizes, used for absorbing blood and other liquids, or other purposes.
Intensive efforts are invested in keeping track of all tools and disposables, in order to make sure no tool or disposable unintentionally remains inside the patient's body. Therefore careful counting is performed before, during and after the operation, including counting the used disposables thrown into the trash bins.
The counting is a tedious job and requires intensive resources, including mental resources, personnel time and down-time of the operating room. Counting the tools and disposables towards the end of an operation also increases the time the patient's body is open and the associated risks.
In addition, counting is not always error-free, and in too many cases tools or disposables end up being left within the patient's body, causing severe damage and even death.
Another problem relates to the life cycle of tools. For example, the tools used in an operation have to be sanitized or sterilized prior to further usage. Other constraints may relate to maintenance operations required for the tools, for example, a blade may have to be sharpened after every predetermined number of operations in which it is used. In another example, tools that have been used in an operation performed on a patient with a contiguous disease may require extra sterilization before further usage, or the like. Making sure that each tool is used and maintained properly also imposes expenses and requires resources, including record keeping and tracking, manual labor and the like. Currently there is no computerized formal procedure of tracking the tools, in order for example to avoid cases in which damaged instruments are brought back to the operating room. There is also no formal procedure in which the operating room personnel communicates with the Central Sterilizing Supply Unit (CSSU) personnel, as to the problems or condition of instruments and/or tools, which may be have disastrous consequences to patients.
Similar considerations exist in additional environments, such as hangars, garages or the like, in which it is necessary to make sure no tool or disposable is left within an engine, for example, before indicating it can be declared as functioning properly, and wherein tools may require periodical maintenance.
Current techniques do not provide answers to the technological difficulties associated with identification of tools, including insufficient coverage, identification when no contact is formed between a tool to be identified and an identifying device, problems caused by metallic environment or an intensive-radiation environment, such as an operation room, or others.
There is thus a need in the art for a system for tracking and identifying equipment including tools and disposables in a complex, optionally metallic, environment, in order to keep track of the equipment before, during and after using them, and in order to maintain the equipment according to the required standards.